Borussia Dortmund attacker Marco Reus does not feel his team have a realistic chance of beating Bayern Munich to the Bundesliga title this season.
Thomas Tuchel's men are eight points behind Pep Guardiola's league leaders in second place after 17 games as they recuperate during the winter break with a training camp in Abu Dhabi.
Dortmund are six points ahead of third-placed Hertha Berlin and a further three in front of Borussia Monchengladbach.
Reus, 26, feels consolidating second place is the most realistic goal for his team from here, particularly given their disappointing season in 2014-15, when they finished down in seventh.
"Our main objective is to maintain the distance between us and the teams behind us," Reus said to the Bundesliga's official website.
"We are in a good position to do that. We are playing Borussia Monchengladbach, one of our direct competitors, in our first game back and we have to be up for it from the off.
"We have been a lot better than last season but it will still be difficult to catch Bayern because they are so consistent."
Reus was reasonably happy with Dortmund's displays in the first half of the campaign, but is aware they can get better.
The Germany international added: "Overall I think we had a good first half to the season. We scored a ton of goals and put in some great performances over a number of weeks. We have scored a crazy amount of goals.
"But we have conceded a few too. That obviously has something to do with the way we play, but we need to be a bit more solid at the back so we can defend leads over a longer period.
"Apart from that we also want to be a bit more flexible in our play and score even more goals if we can.
"The competitiveness of the Bundesliga is so high that it hardly matters what team you play. If you don't give 100 per cent, you have no chance and we know that."
Dortmund face an away game at Gladbach in a crucial clash when the Bundesliga returns next Saturday.
